


Eyes and Hands

by MissNaya



Category: DCU
Genre: Blood and Injury, Established Relationship, Flashbacks, M/M, Old Friends, Reminiscing, Swordfighting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-20
Updated: 2021-02-20
Packaged: 2021-03-17 02:47:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,437
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29586072
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MissNaya/pseuds/MissNaya
Summary: Injured, healing factor disrupted, Slade goes to visit an old flame to get patched up.
Relationships: Ra's al Ghul/Slade Wilson
Comments: 3
Kudos: 21





	Eyes and Hands

**Author's Note:**

> this was another anonymous request! it's a lot different than what I normally do, but I had fun with it! enjoy :)

It’s been a long time since Slade has been in this position.

Ra’s’ hands are as skilled as ever, worn by time and experience. He stitches up gashes with all the patience and speed of a surgeon who’s been doing this for decades. And he has been, but not for decades; for centuries, so that it’s second nature, the way he disinfects the wounds and pulls tissue closed.

It’s a silent process for the most part, which Slade is comfortable with. He was never much of a talker. And being this close to Ra’s, it gives him a lot to think about.

He remembers being younger. Dumber. More reckless, less jaded.

Remembers taking on a contract to assassinate the leader of the League of Assassins. Dumb fucking idea. There’s a reason Ra’s controls assassins, and Slade learned that the day he ended up with a sword to his throat in the middle of the desert.

 _“You fight honorably,”_ Ra’s had said. “ _I will spare your life, on one condition._ ”

And that’s how he found himself working as the newest member of the League. Not a full member, mind you, more on a contract basis. Slade is a freelancer, not an employee, after all. But there was something that warmed his chest about the thought of being on-call for one of the world’s most powerful men. Something liberating in a way skulking around for politicians and warlords never was.

“You’re smirking,” Ra’s says to him now, as he works on a deep gash in Slade’s side. “Is this funny to you?”

“Just thinking,” Slade says.

“Of?”

“When we first met.”

Ra’s stops working and straightens up. In the low candlelight, he looks almost ethereal, the gold of his robes and jewelry glinting against green fabric and deep tan skin. He’s aged a bit, probably due for the pit soon; gray hairs at his temples, a streak of white running through his beard. And yet, he still seems as lively as a man less than a quarter of his age.

A man like Slade.

“And what,” Ra’s asks, “has gotten you thinking of such things?”

“Your hands.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Your hands,” Slade says, reaching out to grab one. Ra’s has long fingers and dark nails, adding to that demonic quality about him befitting of the Demon’s Head. They’re stained with blood, no gloves on them; a body like Slade’s doesn’t succumb to illness the same way someone without his rapid healing would, and Ra’s claims it’s easier to feel around for what he’s doing without them.

“My hands,” Ra’s repeats. He doesn’t pull back. Doesn’t react with the indignation of someone who thinks of himself as a god among mortal men. He might have, long ago. Before they grew used to each other’s touch.

“Do you remember,” Slade says, “the first time you did this for me?”

“I have a great many memories of the two of us,” Ra’s says. “Perhaps you can enlighten me.”

Slade knows it’s bullshit. Knows Ra’s remembers it as well as he does. He just wants to hear him say it.

“You wanted the head of a billionaire oil tycoon,” Slade says. “Paid me to match.”

“And you…” Ra’s starts.

“...didn’t know he had his own assassins as bodyguards.” Slade thinks back to it. “Metahumans. Five of them.”

“Ah,” Ra’s hums, “I do think I remember. You brought me six heads that day.”

“And they were a bitch to carry all the way out here with those damn wounds of mine,” Slade grunts. “Shot me with something that interrupted my healing factor. I’d have bled out without…”

Ra’s’ mouth is turned up at the corner, a small smirk. “Without me.”

_Slade. Young. Darker hair. Dark with blood, anyway._

_The desert sands sinking beneath his feet. A duffel bag in one hand. His guts in the other. More or less; they may as well be, with how deep the wound in his stomach is. Every movement hurts. Every bit of it a pain that he has to grit his teeth to tamp down on._

_He thinks, then, that Ra’s will have no use for a bloodied and beaten assassin. That he’ll laugh when he arrives, turn him away and send him back into the heat and the dryness until he falls over and succumbs to his wounds. Slade wonders if, at last, his actions have caught up with him._

_He doesn’t expect Ra’s’ hands._

_Doesn’t expect them to be soft. Gentle. Doesn’t expect to be taken and laid down on a mat, tended to with care._

_“You’re good at this,” he manages to grit out._

_“I have trained as a physician,” Ra’s tells him. “And I have seen worse.”_

_“Well, good,” Slade says, a bit sarcastic, a bit loopy, head falling back to smack against the ground. He sees stars. It’s been a while since he’s been so lightheaded._

_Ra’s’ hands, dutiful and steady, weave sutures in and out of his skin. He mops the blood and sweat from Slade’s face, brings water to his lips and encourages him to drink._

_It doesn’t take a Lazarus Pit, but Ra’s sure succeeds in bringing Slade back to life._

Slade seems like he wants to protest just out of habit of being stubborn. He doesn’t, though. He settles back down, feeling much like he did way back then, at Ra’s’ mercy. And Ra’s is surprisingly merciful.

Is it him, he wonders? Something about Slade that’s special, that warrants this kind of attention? Or does Ra’s show this side to whoever he gets alone? It’s hard to imagine. He’s ruthless with Talia, with Damian, his own flesh and blood. Caring in his own way, but ruthless.

This… No, this is a side Slade doesn’t think many other people have seen. And if they have, they’re long dead by now.

Talia’s mother, maybe, he wonders. Perhaps she got to see the things those hands could do.

“...I remember,” Ra’s says, after a long moment working on a longer gash, “the one moment in time you came close to besting me in battle. Do you, Wilson?”

Slade smirks. “How could I ever forget?”

_“Again.”_

_Slade lifts to his feet, swinging his sword with all his strength behind it. It clashes with Ra’s’, sending sparks flying between them._

_And that’s always how it is with them, isn’t it?_

_Those sparks from their swords, the sparks in Ra’s’ eyes when Slade pulls a maneuver to try and catch him off-guard. He thinks, a few times, that it works, but every time, he ends up on his back with a sword to his throat._

_“Again,” Ra’s always says._

_And Slade always gets to his feet and does as he’s told._

_He’s not a man who often does as he’s told. Sure, it comes with the territory of being a mercenary, but he’s not the kind of person to shut up and obey if he doesn’t feel it’s right. But there’s something about Ra’s, something that he understands. Maybe it’s their kinship over being nigh-unkillable assassins. Maybe it’s something else._

_Whatever it is, he continues to fight, continues to hack and slash even as his own skin gets cut up._

_He’s panting, dripping blood the last time that Ra’s says “Again” that day. Raising to his feet, he feels the sizzling of his skin rapidly closing, that stinging burn as nerve endings and blood vessels re-attach._

_And then he attacks._

_They clash, hot and heavy, swords crashing against each other. Ra’s nearly knocks Slade’s out of his hands at one point, but he holds firm. Keeps his grip even with his own blood slicking up the hilt of the sword._

_And then he catches Ra’s off-guard._

_It’s a split second thing. All he notices is Ra’s staring at his lips, and, on instinct, Slade licks them. And that’s all the time he needs to raise his sword, bringing it down to slash through Ra’s’ robes and cut a long, red slit down his chest._

_He doesn’t stop there, and neither does Ra’s. He keeps going, and Ra’s backs up, fighting through the pain, through the blood as it splashes at their feet._

_“Good,” Ra’s tells him. “There is anger within you, Wilson. Use that.”_

_And what would Ra’s know about his anger? Young, hotheaded, Slade pushes forward, striking Ra’s’ arm with his sword. Just a light glance, but enough to stain his sleeve with blood._

_He’s got the upper hand. He knows he does. And Ra’s is encouraging him on, not letting up, but getting fatigued, he can see it. They’ve been at this for hours._

_It’s perhaps luck, perhaps fate, perhaps skill that sends Ra’s’ sword flying after a well-placed strike from Slade. But it lands several feet away from them, and then it’s Slade’s sword at Ra’s’ neck._

_“Impressive,” he says, clapping those black-nailed hands. “But you secrete arrogance. It is best not to do so when one is not sure if one has claimed victory.”_

_“Seems like I’m pretty victorious from where I’m standing,” Slade says._

_“Ah,” Ra’s says, “but not from my perspective.”_

_And, like a flash, Ra’s is gone, only a shadow in the corner of Slade’s good eye before he feels the press of a blade into his throat from behind. League of Shadows is right; the bastard moves like one, all liquid and intangibility._

_“That,” Ra’s tells him, “is your fatal flaw, Slade Wilson. You have as many ways of thinking as you have eyes. Your perspective is skewed.”_

_“Yeah, yeah,” he says, his Adam’s apple bobbing against the dagger at his throat. “You know I had you.”_

“No,” Ra’s says in the present. “You did not ‘have’ me.”

“I think I did,” Slade smirks. His one eye shines with mischief. “You just can’t admit it.”

“A gift to you, from your generous benefactor,” Ra’s says. “The illusion of coming close to besting me. A thoughtful present from someone of my standing, is it not?”

Slade puffs out a laugh and rolls his eyes. “You’ve got an ego bigger than my ex-wife’s. That’s impressive.”

 _And attractive,_ Slade thinks. After all, there was a reason he got together with Adeline.

He sees some of her in Ra’s, in that confidence, that anger that sears just beneath the surface. Ra’s is an emotional man even if he won’t admit it. Slade has seen the fires of it burn when he talks about man’s ever-ruinous path through the wonders of the Earth. Sees passion there when he talks about what he lives for, the mission he’s spent centuries working tirelessly toward.

There’s something about it, about that zeal, that’s always attracted Slade.

Maybe that’s why he showed up here. Maybe he just wanted to see the look in Ra’s’ eyes, too subtle for anyone else to notice, but after all these years, Slade knows it’s there. That hardly-there, burning anger. The indignation that Slade would end up in such a sorry state again.

It feels nice, having someone worry about him. Even if that person will never admit that he is.

Slade is fine with that. His relationships have always been built on mutual things left unsaid. His love for his ex-wife. For his children. Even his slight kinship with the Nightwing brat and his demon Robin. Words are for the people who have enough skill to craft with them, to create things that add to the silence, not detract from it.

Slade is not one of those people. Ra’s, eloquent as he is, isn’t one, either.

Yet still, he talks.

“To be compared to Miss Kane,” Ra’s says. “I am not sure if I should feel complimented or insulted.”

“I’ll let you figure it out,” Slade says, a sparkle in his eye.

And then they sit in silence for a few more minutes, Ra’s working dutifully to close up the last of Slade’s wounds. Slade barely grimaces for it all, even with no anesthesia. He’s felt worse.

_Dark nails. Wrinkled hands. Soft, though, when they cup his face, encourage him to drink water that spills sloppily down his beard._

_Pain, searing, in his gut. Healing factor not yet completely restored. An infection, that’s what Ra’s says. Slade doesn’t remember the last time he’s had one of those._

_He hardly remembers anything about that time period at all. Hardly anything except those hands. Tending him. Changing his sweat-soaked clothes. Brushing his over-long hair out of his face when he leans over to vomit the pitiful contents of his stomach all over the floor._

“You’re staring again,” comes Ra’s’ voice. “Do you have a fetish I am unaware of, Wilson?”

Slade blinks up from where he’d been looking intently at Ra’s’ blood-slick hands. He’s wiping up the area around the stitches now, cleaning it with a cloth, almost tender. Placing a square of gauze on it that he tapes to Slade’s skin.

“Not sure if that’s what I’d call it.”

“It does not have to be sexually-charged to be a fetish, my dear boy,” Ra’s chuckles. “But a fixation. A strong one. Such as the one you have with my hands.”

“Hard not to,” Slade says, “when they’ve been inside me so much.”

A knowing smirk passes over Ra’s’ face. They share that private moment between themselves, memories of times spent together flashing through their minds.

“...Okay,” Slade says after a long moment. “You got me. Maybe it is. A fetish, I mean.”

He reaches out to take one of Ra’s’ hands, expecting him to pull away. He doesn’t. Slade doesn’t give a shit about the blood, letting it spread warm and wet onto his own hand.

Toying with Ra’s’ hand, he turns it over, exposing the soft palm. Runs his fingers over it, over all the little cracks and crevices. Spreads the blood until it goes thin and pink.

So much skill in those hands. So much precision. Not just in taking lives, but in giving them back. And that’s the funny thing, isn’t it? An assassin who’s also a surgeon, a doctor. One who can bring you back just as easily as he could snuff you out.

Slade isn’t like that. Deathstroke is destruction, plain and simple. Nothing built, nothing born. Everything killed. Lives. Relationships. Nothing remains intact for very long near Slade.

Nothing, except for this strange decades-long relationship that he shares with Ra’s al Ghul.

“That’s quite alright,” Ra’s says to him. His own voice has taken on a softer quality. It’s a tone that none of his minions would ever hear, and it makes Slade, privately, feel special. “We all have our… fixations.”

“Oh?” Slade arches a bushy brow. “And what would yours be, Demon Head?”

There’s silence for a few moments. Long enough that Slade thinks the question will never be answered, which is fine by him. Gives him more time to trace the lines on Ra’s’ palm.

But he does get an answer. Eventually.

“...Your eye.”

Slade blinks. “My eye?”

“Yes.” He tugs his hand free of Slade’s grasp, raising it to cup his face. “I must admit, it intrigues me that, of all that grows back, your eye remains gone. I wonder, is it truly gone forever? Or do you just prefer to keep such a scar, a reminder of what you’ve lost?”

Slade frowns. He doesn’t like to think about the day he lost his eye. Doesn’t like to think about Joey’s hot blood under his hands, the gurgling sounds he made, the last sounds he’d ever make. Doesn’t like to think of Addie’s horrified screams followed by her cool, calculating anger.

Ra’s must sense the change in mood. He strokes his painted thumb under Slade’s good eye, swiping the skin there red with blood.

“...No matter,” he says. “I suspect the addition of your second eye would be more a handicap than a boon at this point.”

Slade scoffs. “You got that right.”

“Yes,” Ra’s says, “you’ve gained quite the perspective with your lone eye, haven’t you, Wilson? Seeing the world the way you do… I admit, it intrigues me.”

“Didn’t think someone like you could be intrigued so easily,” Slade says.

“Someone like me?” Ra’s’ lips curl up into a little smile. “And what kind of person would that be?”

Slade stops to think. He doesn’t know how to answer that question. Who is Ra’s al Ghul? An assassin. A leader. A terrorist. A surgeon. A father. A husband. An enemy. An ally.

Maybe something more than all that. Or something between all of it. Slade doesn’t know. He’s never been any good with relationships.

“You know exactly what I mean,” he says instead, in the hopes that Ra’s actually does.

Perhaps choosing to take mercy on him, Ra’s says, “I think I do.”

They sit like that for another moment. Close. Ra’s with his hand cupping Slade’s face. Slade sitting up on his elbows, with his gut throbbing in pain.

He hardly registers the pain anymore. Doesn’t care about it. He’s been in worse situations, seen worse sights when he’s wounded than Ra’s al Ghul’s face. All things considered, he made out quite well tonight.

Then, like a string snapping, the tension eases. Ra’s trails his hand down the side of Slade’s face, thumb stroking just under his lower lip. Slade sucks the tip of his thumb into his mouth and bites, baring his teeth, just to be an asshole.

Ra’s pulls his hand back. “I see you’re as lively as ever. It seems the surgery was a success.”

“If it wasn’t,” Slade says, “you’d be getting a big bill for malpractice.”

“Knowing you, I am certain it would be in the millions,” Ra’s says with that tiny smile of his.

“Knowing you, you could afford it,” Slade fires back.

“That does remind me,” Ra’s says, and he reaches behind himself, pawing for a smartphone nearby. It’s anachronistic in this low-tech tent they’re in, lit by candlelight instead of electricity. But the march of progress never stops, and it would be hard to be connected to the world as a super-assassin without keeping up to date with the latest technology.

“Oh, great,” Slade says. “Another job?”

“You should take a great deal of pride in this one,” Ra’s tells him. “Our intelligence has told us that not only does this man control several corporations that account for two percent of all greenhouse gases in the world, but he’s recently gotten into trafficking. Of the human variety.”

“Human?”

“Ones under 16, most often.”

Slade’s not a good man. He’s no hero. No vigilante. But he _is_ a father. And, as a father, the thought of children being ripped from their homes and sold on the black market as sex slaves? It gets to him, just a little.

He takes the phone from Ra’s and looks down to where he brought up a picture of his next target. Fucker. Slimy and crooked-faced, the man _looks_ like a pedophile, like the kind of person the world would be better off without.

Well. If he’s getting paid for it, might as well take out the trash, right?

“Of course, you’ll be compensated fairly for your efforts,” Ra’s says.

“Of course.” Slade memorizes the name and face, then passes the phone back. He can tell he’s going to be satisfied with this one no matter how many zeroes Ra’s adds to the check, but he’s already certain there’ll be a lot of them this time. “Anyone else you want me to look out for while we’re here?”

“That is the biggest challenge I have for you right now,” Ra’s says. “Unless you would like some smaller targets.”

“No,” Slade says, waving a dismissive hand. “No. This one’s fine. When you want him done by?”

“As soon as possible.”

“Got it.” Slade pushes himself up to his feet, grunting a little. Ra’s looks up at him, but doesn’t move to follow. “Thanks for the assist. But I’ve got a few other contracts before yours.”

“Yes, of course,” Ra’s says, folding his hands in his lap. They’re still shiny pink and red with blood, though most of it has been wiped away by now. “It was a pleasure as always, Terminator.”

“Mhm.” Slade turns his back so he doesn’t have to think about how badly he wants to stay. “Pleasure’s all mine, gramps.”

“Watch your tongue, Wilson,” Ra’s calls after him as he ducks out of the tent. “It may be the next part of yours to go.”

“Yeah, yeah.” Slade just chuckles, tent flap falling down behind him. “You can have it if it does.”

And as he stalks away through the oppressive desert elements, he thinks again of those hands, and smiles.

**Author's Note:**

> find me [here](https://linktr.ee/herecomesnaya)


End file.
